Hi everyone- I figured I'd start one of these up in case anyone wanted to comment today on the progress of today's Entry Draft.
I usually follow it a lot closer, but the fact is that this year's just isn't very good. Most people who know say this has the least amount of talent since 2000, when the only first round picks worth mentioning now were Adrian Gonzalez (taken 1st), Rocco Baldelli (6th) and Chase Utley (15th). This year's draft is severely lacking in college bats, and doesn't have any blockbuster high schoolers either. There are a lot of college arms whose stock has risen and fallen on a near-daily basis this season. The key will be predicting which of those will turn into real major leaguers. There are definitely no sure things this year.
That said, it's a good year for the Brewers to be picking 16th. With so many pitchers bunched together by scouts, we should see something decent fall. Jim Callis at Baseball America made his first-round predictions this morning, and he has the Brewers taking left-handed high school pitcher Kasey Kiker, from Alabama (note and video here). He notes that the Brewers prefer either a college arm, or one of two high school hitters, OF Travis Snider or OF/1B Chris Parmalee. If all of those are gone, the Brewers likely will be left to chose from Kiker, HS righthander Jeremy Jeffress, or HS righthander Caleb Clay.
John Sickels' mock draft has the Brewers taking University of North Carolina righthander Daniel Bard. Sickels' comment on Bard: "Bard has one of the most powerful arms in the class, but could fall this far due to occasional command issues." Callis has Bard going to San Francisco at #10, saying he's their preference going in.
The Brewers have recently been taking a "best player available" approach to the draft, and I would certainly assume they'll do the same in the next couple of days.
The draft starts at Noon Central time, and BaseballAmerica.com and MLB.com have pretty decent coverage, with MLB.com having video. I'll try to update at least the Brewers' picks as they happen.
Update [2006-6-6 18:36:45 by Jeff]: Here's the complete list through 15 rounds:
- Jeremy Jeffress, RHP (HS)
- Brent Brewer, SS (HS)
- Cole Gillespie, LF (Oregon St)
- Evan Anundsen, RHP (Columbine HS)
- Christopher Errecart, LF (UC Berkeley)
- Mich Wright, LHP (Oklahoma St.)
- Andrew Bouchie, C (Oral Roberts U)
- Charles Hill, RHP (HS)
- Shawn Ferguson, RHP (Texas Christian)
- Michael McClendon, RHP (JC)
- Zachary Clem, LF (U Washington)
- Chad Robertson, RHP (HS)
- Christopher Toneguzzi, RHP (Purdue)
- Hector Bernal, SS (JC)
- Brent Whiteside, C (HS)